Enable Hyper-V on Windows 8.1

Step 1: Prerequisites

The following prerequisites are required to successfully run Client Hyper-V on Windows 8.1:

• Windows 8 Pro or Enterprise 64 bit Operating System
• 64 bit processor with Second Level Address Translation (SLAT)
• 4GB system RAM at minimum
• BIOS-level Hardware Virtualization support
   

Step 2: Setting Up Hyper-V

1. Ensure that hardware virtualization support is turned on in the BIOS settings.
   
2. Save the BIOS settings and boot up the machine normally,
    
3. At the Start Screen, swipe the right hand side of the screen and select the Search Charm.
    
4. Type turn windows features on or off and select that item 
    
5. Select and enable Hyper-V
    
6. If Hyper-V was not previously enabled, reboot the machine to apply the change. 
    
   NOTE: As a best practice, it’s a good idea to configure networking for the Hyper-V environment to support external network connections. Ensure that a virtual switch has been created and is functional. 
    
7. Open the Virtual Switch Manager, found on the Actions panel in the Hyper-V Manager, by typing Hyper-V at the Start Screen.
   
8. Select “Virtual Switch Manager” in the Actions pane.
    
9. Ensure that “External” is highlighted, and then click on the “Create Virtual Switch” button.
   

If more than one NIC in is present, ensure that the proper NIC is selected for use on the VM external network connections.
 
NOTE: There are a great deal of other options and features that can be configure.  This Step-By-Step provides a good starting point and is all that is needed to start creating and using VMs on Window 8 Pro.

cr. http://blogs.technet.com